Love Me (Love The Way Book 3) Read online

  LOVE ME

  LOVE THE WAY YOU BOOK 3

  W. WINTERS

  AMELIA WILDE

  CONTENTS

  Love Me

  Playlist

  Prologue

  1. Zander

  2. Ella

  3. Zander

  4. Ella

  5. Zander

  6. Ella

  7. Zander

  8. Ella

  9. Zander

  10. Ella

  11. Zander

  12. Ella

  13. Zander

  14. Ella

  15. Zander

  16. Ella

  17. Zander

  18. Zander

  19. Ella

  20. Zander

  21. Ella

  22. Zander

  Epilogue

  Also by W. Winters

  About W. Winters

  Connect with Amelia Wilde

  LOVE ME

  BOOK 3 OF THE LOVE THE WAY YOU SERIES

  W Winters and Amelia Wilde

  From USA Today best-selling authors W Winters and Amelia Wilde comes a sinful romance with a touch of dark and angst that will keep you gripping the edge of your seat … and begging for more.

  He was mine. My protector, my lover.

  My second start at life.

  The man who promised me there was more than this.

  He gave me hope.

  Until my world fell apart again.

  It was bound to happen. It’s all life has given me.

  Maybe he won’t break his promises.

  Maybe my heart won’t shatter.

  All I want … is for love to be enough.

  This is book 3 of the Love the Way You series. Kiss Me (book 1) and Hold Me (book 2) must be read first.

  PLAYLIST

  Airplanes - B.o.B. featuring Hayley Williams

  Ho Hey - The Lumineers

  I Wanna Be Your Slave Måneskin

  Nothing More - Here’s to the Heartache

  Riptide - Vance Joy

  AJR - Bang!

  Pumped Up Kicks - Foster The People

  I Love It - Icona Pop featuring Charli XCX

  What Ifs - Kane Brown featuring Lauren Alaina

  Somethin’ Bad - Miranda Lambert and Carrie Underwood

  PROLOGUE

  Ella

  Four years ago, before tragedy struck

  “You know I care for you, don’t you?” he questions and there’s a hint of something I can’t place. Something in his tone he’s never given me before. We’ve been on again and off again for years now. Something tonight is different.

  “Of course I do.” During all that’s happened, he’s always cared for me. God knows I’ve been to hell and back with a bottle of tequila, and he’s been there all through the night and in the morning. He’s cared in other ways too. Ones that give me this insecure feeling I can’t shake. The wind blusters in, shifting the curtains and the moonlight stirs in the expansive room. There were boundaries before tonight, boundaries that seem to disappear when he looks at me like that.

  James is the only lover I’ve ever had who’s kept my secrets … he’s the only one I’ve told the darkest ones to.

  “Then why won’t you talk to me?” he asks.

  As a chill sweeps along my shoulders, I pull the covers up higher, settling deeper into the bed.

  “I think I love you,” I tell him, although I’m reluctant to admit it. I roll onto my side as I do, pulling the satin sheets with me and ignoring the groan of the bed. I’m still sore between my thighs and I have to hold back a sated moan of content. The fan revolves in the silence and I turn from looking at the shadows it casts on the ceiling to stare at the man who’s making me remember too much, making me feel too much.

  James … my on-again, off-again lover I can’t resist.

  His lips quirk up into a cocky smirk as he props himself up on one elbow and then moves a hand beside me, so that he towers slightly over me. Still silent, not giving an inch and only finding amusement in my statement.

  A humorless laugh leaves me, and I press against his chest but he doesn’t move. He continues staring down at me, watching and waiting. For what? I don’t know.

  “Leave me be, you sex fiend,” I tease. “Sleep is tempting me and I’d like to take it up on its offer if I can.” He knows how hard it is for me to sleep. Insomnia is something that bonded us. Oddly, with him in my bed, I sleep so much better. Rolling onto my side I pretend to ignore him and he lies down beside me, then nips the lobe of my ear, making me squeal. I can’t help that the slight pain sends a ripple of want through me, reviving the pleasure I felt only moments ago.

  “You think you love me?” he questions with a hint of awe in his tone and I’m forced to look at him over my shoulder.

  It’s hard to tell if he’s toying with me. If he’s playing around like we do with each other or if he’s being serious.

  “I have feelings for you,” I whisper back, unwilling to be open and vulnerable until he is first. For some reason, when I look at him, refusing to give him what he wants, my chest aches. There’s a tenderness for him I haven’t felt before.

  “Tell me you love me,” he commands and my bottom lip drops, my body already wanting to give him anything he demands. It’s dangerous, though. Especially for a girl like me. Kamden’s warning is there on the tip of my tongue. Money is a drug that people will do anything and everything to obtain, and it can leave you with nothing. Love doesn’t change that and my name alone is worth enough money that no one outside of my inner circle can ever be fully trusted. But Kamden knows James, and he knows what James knows.

  That chill comes back again.

  James’s eyebrow cocks humorously. If he knew the thoughts racing in my mind, he wouldn’t think it was so funny.

  My expression slips before I can stop it and he moves to hover over me. “What’s wrong?”

  Pushing away from him, I wish he would stop. I wish it would all stop. “I don’t want this life anymore. I don’t—”

  “El, I can give you whatever you want.”

  “Promises, promises,” I whisper with my eyes closed, not wanting to think.

  “I can promise you the world,” he says with such sincerity my throat closes.

  They’re the same promises my father gave my mother. The assurances that fool women into trusting men and leaning on them, into loving with everything they have. It’s all too much.

  “I don’t need you to promise me the world, James,” I tell him as if he needs reminding.

  I smirk at him, and the spaghetti strap of my black silk cami falls down my shoulder. James’s gaze follows it and there’s a hunger there, a lust … but when he looks back up at me, it shifts.

  My heartbeat pauses, frozen where it is. As if it too wants to know if that’s love in his gorgeous eyes.

  “You don’t need promises,” he scoffs at me before kissing the tender spot on my neck. Whispering at the shell of my ear he says, “You love it when I fuck you like I did tonight, though, don’t you?”

  I can only hum in response, my body instantly responding to his as his warmth covers me. “You know why I love fucking you like I do?”

  “Hmm?” is my only answer to him, as if I don’t care, as if it’s not a thought that keeps me up at night. He doesn’t answer until my eyes are on him.

  “I love that I tame you.”

  They say he fucks the wild out of me. He has me on a leash. I don’t know how or why, but he does.

  “You’re saying love an awful lot tonight,” I murmur.

  “Is that really why you’re acting differently? Because you love me?”

  “Because I’m scared to love you.” Before he can respond I add, “To love anyone.”

  “You can love me, Ella. I promise,” he tells me. “I’ll protect you, provide for you.”

  My gaze drops to the moonlight spilling across the bedroom floor. I can’t look at him as the memories flash through my mind.

  Promises, promises. Men give them out like candy. James whispers promises just like my father did to my mother.

  Those promises he gave her that she fell for.

  The promises he told before he killed her. And before I killed him.

  ZANDER

  Present time

  The mixture of anger and fear are so intense that I could never calm myself. It’s impossible to feel anything other than rage as my hands tremble. My feelings won’t make any difference in the end, though. I’m going to do what I need to for Ella even if my heart is pounding so hard it threatens to leave my chest.

  It hasn’t stopped since I left the motel. This unwanted concoction of emotions threatens to consume me.

  All I need to do is gain control over this situation. And that means getting to Ella. The sound of my footsteps echoing on the staircase is foreboding as I climb up to the next floor. My ears burn knowing everyone else knew where she was before me. The fact she called Kam over me is something I’ll have to deal with later.

  Speak of the fucking devil.

  As I round the corner to the hall, Kam stands outside the door to her bedroom, his arms crossed over his chest. His irritation darkens his eyes and furrows his brow. The closer I get, the more palpable his anger is.

  I’m thankful now for all the years on the job. Difficult clients and high-stress situations. High-risk scenarios. Nothing has ever felt like this before, though. Like I’m on the cusp of losing her. Losing everything. All my experience with The Firm mean
s nothing if I don’t have Ella. Kam can be pissed all he wants; he can’t make me feel any worse than I do right now.

  Kam draws himself up to his full height as I stop in front of him, the wooden floor creaking slightly. “You have no idea how badly you fucked up, do you?”

  He squares up with me like he wants to fight and as much as I’d love to oblige, my feelings on the matter are irrelevant. Still, I sure as hell don’t want to get into a discussion of whether or not I fucked up, let alone how it all happened. I want to get to Ella. I need to get to her. I will make damn sure she never runs from me again.

  If Kam weren’t her conservator, I’d ignore him entirely. As it is, she called him. I can’t ignore that.

  “Is she okay?” I ask in as level a tone I can manage, bypassing Kam’s question to discuss the only topic that matters.

  Kam lets out a breath. He’s obviously pissed, but wary as well. His expression slips, revealing he’s more scared than anything. Fuck. I didn’t think I could sink any lower, that I could feel fear any more than I did the entire drive here.

  “Is she all right?” I demand.

  “Right now? She’ll be okay,” he admits finally. “I ran her a bath. When she’s finished in there, she needs to get some sleep.”

  I can breathe again with a hint of relief. But only a hint. He continues, “Damon checked her out, and there’s nothing wrong, but she needs rest. I was just stepping out to get her some water. She’s … not sober. I’ll stay with her tonight.”

  “I’ll be staying with her tonight.”

  “Zander, no. I—”

  With my shoulder to him, I go around Kamden toward her bedroom. It’s a good five feet away and I eat up the distance with him trailing behind me.

  I half expect Kam to argue with me. He could try to drag me away from Ella’s room, and I wouldn’t put it past him. If I were in his shoes, I’d be doing the same. Both of us are trying to beat the other one to be the first to the door.

  It doesn’t really matter who’s first. I’m going to go in. She’s mine. This problem is mine to fix.

  As we take the final steps to reach Ella, the fear comes back. I’ll never be able to get those images of her out of my mind. The way she seemed to get more and more distant as the night went on. The panic I felt when she fell from that ledge. Leaving me in the middle of the night in a strange motel.

  Something I did triggered her and led to her spiral. I saw it happening and I hung back thinking I could catch her at any moment. I failed her.

  A cold sweat lingers on the back of my neck as I grip the glass doorknob.

  I’m genuinely afraid to lose her, yet we’ve been reckless. I regret that. I should have been more careful with her. I also should have made a few things much clearer. I’ll be rectifying that immediately.

  That’s the danger of falling in love. You break rules. Find excuses to justify your actions. She has clouded my judgment from the first moment I saw her. I knew better from the very beginning with Ella, but I couldn’t stop myself. I felt too much for her.

  In my own weakness, I risked losing her because I didn’t have the strength to tear myself away. Now it’s too late for that, even if Kam made a real attempt to stop me. There is nothing that will keep me from her ever again.

  Kam grabs my shoulder and turns me to face him. His expression is dead serious, the anger in his pale blue eyes cold and menacing.

  “Listen,” he says in a low voice, nearly a hiss, his hand still gripping my shoulder. “If you don’t take control of this situation, then I will.” His eyes search mine, his lips pressed in a grim line.

  This isn’t like him, but Kam’s been pushed to the limit tonight. I see my own fear reflected in his eyes. He grits his teeth and continues. “Nothing that happened tonight can ever happen again. If you fail her, I’ll destroy you.”

  The strength of conviction in his tone only makes me like the man more.

  I can respect the protectiveness Kam feels right now, even if I think it should be solely my responsibility to care for her.

  He could never take me from her, though. Not unless he killed me.

  My first priority is Ella. It will be for as long as I’m alive. “Understood,” I tell Kam. My tone isn’t as even as I wanted. The tension in the air thickens. My muscles are ready for violence. It would at least take the edge off if we came to blows. Muffled sounds of Ella moving around inside her bedroom can be heard. She must be finished with her bath.

  If we’re going to fight, it’ll have to be later. Kam seems to realize that at the same time I do. “Good.”

  He releases me and I release the knob, opting to knock on the door first. “Ella?”

  There’s no answer from the other side. I do a set of four-count breaths to calm the fuck down and focus, followed by another one. Then I open the door.

  My heart races again the moment I cross the threshold. All of the terror that had been dampened from going toe to toe with Kam comes back full force.

  Ella’s sadness hangs in the air inside her bedroom. The space is clean, containing muted tones and decorated with expensive furniture. The mood isn’t a neat and tidy one, though. It’s heavy. Pervasive. Almost as if it’s hard to breathe.

  Ella leans against her dresser; the mirror is still one made of polished metal rather than glass. It’s a reminder of what happened to her before.

  With damp hair clinging to her back, she turns her head to look over her shoulder at me. Those beautiful chestnut eyes reach mine and there’s longing there but something else too.

  The sight of her makes my breath hitch. Wrapped only in a towel, her face is flushed from crying. Her cheeks are tearstained and her eyes rimmed in red. She’s the epitome of sadness, and appearing so small in the expansive room, it only emphasizes how alone she must feel. Ella’s home is beautiful, but it doesn’t change the heartbreak in the woman standing in front of me.

  Relief hits me harder, shocking my heart. There she is. She’s alive, her heart still beating. She’s still my Ella.

  “Go away, Z.” Her voice shakes as she tells me to leave. The sorrow shifts to something else as I close the door behind me. It shuts with a foreboding click.

  I take a step toward her. And then another. All the while she stares at me, not daring to command me to do a damn thing.

  With every step, a piece of me returns that she desperately needs. It’s for her. Every fucking thing I do is for her.

  Ella clutches the towel tighter to her chest. I take another step, reaching out a hand until my fingertips meet her skin.

  Her strength begins to crumple at my touch. Ella’s shoulders curve toward me, and I fold her into my arms. This is all I wanted when Kam was blocking my way in the hall. Ella in my arms where she belongs.

  Cold droplets from her hair soak through my shirt, but her warm body molds to mine. She leans into me, letting me hold her. I can’t help but kiss her temple, telling her in as soothing of a voice as I can, “That’s better.”

  “Z, what are you doing here?” she questions, her face still pressed to my chest.

  “Did you think I wasn’t going to come?”

  She pulls away slightly, enough to look up at me and whispers, “It might be better if you go.”

  “Who am I to you?” My voice is harder now, and it’s exactly what she needs.

  Ella’s breathing grows ragged as her eyes shine with new tears. I knew she’d be afraid. I knew she’d question whether I was going to come for her. It’s what caused her to melt down at the party. Her uncertainty is something I have to be patient with. Something I need to tame.

  “Who am I to you?” I ask again.